Zuko Komisa

Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, Minister of Electricity and Energy, has given an update on the country’s power grid. He spoke at a media briefing in Pretoria on Monday morning.
Ramokgopa said the electricity grid would be improved, with producing units due back by the end of August.
The Minister said that while “we remain buoyant” about Eskom’s success, load shedding is still not a thing of the past. He also said the electricity grid would be improved, with producing units due back by the end of August.
The Minister specifically mentioned the Tutuka, Kendal, and Kriel power stations.
“We are expecting Medupi Unit 4 to give us 800MW [megawatts] and to fire up Kusile Unit 6, which is another 800MW. We are hoping to get an extension of life of Koeberg Unit 2… We are not complacent. We are doing everything by the book and we are still optimistic about getting that extension of life, and it will give us an additional 980MW.
“We do expect that by the end of August this year, just from the Eskom fleet, we should be getting an additional 2 500MW,” he said. I really want to caution that load shedding is not behind us. In the next three weeks or so Eskom will be sharing what the summer outlook is. We are still buoyant about the performance of these generation plants. Having said that, we need to caution against any early declaration to decree load shedding as behind us. We do everything possible to resolve this question but the numbers do indicate that we are within touching distance,” Ramokgopa said.
Eskom congratulated itself on Friday, announcing that it had reduced its diesel bill by R9.59 billion over the last five months. Eskom has traditionally spent a lot of money on diesel to maintain its open-cycle gas turbines (OCGTs) operational.
“The generation operational recovery plan continues to deliver efficiencies for Eskom, with R9.59 billion reduction in OCGTs diesel expenditure from 1 April 2024 to 7 August 2024, compared to the same period last year,” said Eskom spokesperson Daphne Mokwena.
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